F1
A maverick top gun in the world of motor sport is drawn back to the game one more time in Joseph Kosinski’s predictably formulaic Formula One adrenaline-rush.
Sporting chance
Courtesy of Warner Bros.
F1 certainly has plenty of rev, a really good-looking body and some neat gear changes, but it is all rather mechanical. However, it’s good to see Brad Pitt back in the driver’s seat – in a project he produced alongside Lewis Hamilton, no less. But it’s Kerry Condon who brings the project a human dimension – and she does it beautifully. With Lewis Hamilton’s access to the inside track of Formula One, the film certainly exudes an air of authenticity and is likely to appeal enormously to petrol heads if not an audience less familiar with the machinery of international motor racing.
Brad Pitt, whose last film, Wolfs, was shunted straight to streaming, plays Sonny Hayes, a speed junkie who is described by a young rival as an “eighty-year-old arsehole”. “But he’s quick,” adds the latter, reluctantly. The latter words are uttered by Joshua Pearce (Damson Idris), a cocky black English racer who spends much of his time on his phone and his head buried in “the noise” of social media. Sonny Hayes couldn’t care less about his perceived persona and isn’t even in it for the money. In fact, Sonny hasn’t raced in F1 for three decades and has left behind a string of ex-wives and girlfriends – and gambling debts. And his latest win at Daytona was meant to be his swan song. He’s then approached by an old ally, Ruben Cervantes (Javier Bardem), a Formula One team owner, and is made an offer that is “one hundred per cent too good to be true.” But Sonny isn’t in it for the money.
Sonny lives in a van and Joshua Pearce still lives with his mother, but maybe the men’s disparities is exactly what Ruben’s APX Grand Prix team needs to make a dent in the final nine races of the season. If the rivals don’t kill each other first…
Joseph Kosinski directed Top Gun: Maverick and he brings the same slick, pumped-up testosterone to the mavericks of the racing world. All the components for a high-octane ride are here, with a bunch of heart-racing track sequences, some nicely tooled supporting characters and a pulsating score from Hans Zimmer. And Brad Pitt is terrific in the self-assured, charismatic manner he has made his own, with some nice banter between him and Kate McKenna (Condon), the world’s first female technical director of an F1 team, which leads to where we know where. But not before she puts him squarely in his place.
But it’s really Damson Idris who’s going to benefit from the commercial mileage of the film, at times recalling a young Eddie Murphy, but with a Peckham accent. He’s going places fast and his next role as Miles Davis, in the Mick Jagger-produced Miles & Juliette, should cement his place in the firmament. And Ehren Kruger’s script, while hardly surprising, has some neat one-liners, even from the largely monosyllabic Sonny. “Hope is not a strategy,” he says, before breaking the rules of the sport yet again.
JAMES CAMERON-WILSON
Cast: Brad Pitt, Damson Idris, Kerry Condon, Tobias Menzies, Javier Bardem, Kim Bodnia, Sarah Niles, Shea Whigham, Will Merrick, Samson Kayo, Callie Cooke, Abdul Salis, Joseph Balderrama, Max Verstappen, Lewis Hamilton, Penélope Cruz.
Dir Joseph Kosinski, Pro Lewis Hamilton, Brad Pitt, Jerry Bruckheimer, Joseph Kosinski, Jeremy Kleiner, Dede Gardner and Chad Oman, Screenplay Ehren Kruger, Ph Claudio Miranda, Pro Des Ben Munro and Mark Tildesley, Ed Stephen Mirrione, Music Hans Zimmer, Costumes Julian Day, Sound Al Nelson, Dialect coach Tim Monich.
Apple Studios/Monolith Pictures/Jerry Bruckheimer Films/Plan B Entertainment/Dawn Apollo Films-Warner Bros.
155 mins. USA. 2025. UK Rel: 25 June 2025. US Rel: 27 June 2025. Cert. 12A.
